Washington (Platts)--28May2008

The US Senate's leading Republican on energy issues said Tuesday that the
country's reliance on oil imports is weakening the country diplomatically,
militarily and economically, presenting the nation with an unprecedented
challenge.

Senator Pete Domenici, the ranking member of the Senate Energy and
Natural Resources Committee, called on Washington to abandon energy policies
implemented since the 1970s and encourage more domestic production of energy
in various forms.

"Without question, the challenges we face are daunting," the New Mexico
lawmaker said in remarks prepared for a ceremony in Hobbs, New Mexico, where
he received an award.

"Our dependence on foreign oil threatens our economic strength, our
foreign policy and our national security. We must find a way to meet rising
global demand with an affordable, reliable supply of energy," he said.

Domenici, who has announced he will not run for re-election in November,
said the US problems are compounded by the need to address global climate
change without damaging the nation's economy, the decline in value of the
dollar, rising commodity prices and a growing trade deficit.

"Simply put: these are the challenges of a generation, and they are
without precedent," he said.

Domenici said some of the major solutions to the energy problems include
reversing policies enacted since the 1970s, when the Carter administration
confronted the first energy crises, which resulted from cutoffs in oil from
the Middle East.

He targeted for elimination government decisions to halt US reprocessing
of spent nuclear fuel, and bar development of oil and natural gas resources
off much of the nation's coastlines and in the Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge.

Such proposals have failed in Congress through Republican and now
Democratic leadership since the 1990s, including recent bids by Republicans to
allow oil and gas drilling in ANWR and in more federal waters.